Bay Area Maker Faire

Most of us on the OC Mini Maker Faire Exploratory Committee are here at the Bay Area Maker Faire for the weekend. We arrived Thursday and met with the Maker Corp Team for a pre-MF walk-through of the San Mateo fairgrounds as part of our volunteer training. Sherry led us around the exhibits and gave us bits of trivia, history and info we’d need, like the fact that there will be over 900 Makers this year.

On Friday we arrived on-site at 9:30 for our first set of Maker Corp Volunteer hours. We worked with Spring to hang signage, which helped us become better acquainted with where things are so later this weekend we can direct people to where they want to go.

In the afternoon, our team attended the Mini Maker Faire Producers workshop led by Sabrina Merlo, it was very inspiring and informative. They broadcast it live on the web for all those who couldn’t make it. MMF Producers from all over the globe were there, including Japan and France. This year there are about 60 Minis being produced around the world!

Finally, at the end of the day was the Maker Mixer where all the Maker Corp Volunteers, Maker Faire Crew and Makers got to meet and greet over Sierra Nevada beer and the best Paella I’ve ever had. The OC Mini Maker Faire Exploratory Committee met many awesome people who are excited about our event. Michael Conn of Mobile Muffins in L.A. said that he’d love to have a drivable cupcake at our event and Lindsay from San Diego is hoping to bring his 17′ tall Electric Giraffe!

We also met Mike Hatalski who wants to bring his 3D printers; Randy from EarthLCD in Costa Mesa; Steve from Scary Tinker Labs, also in Costa Mesa and several other Orange County area people who want to support the OC Mini Maker Faire.

Today is the first day of Maker Faire 2012, James and Amanda are already at the fairgrounds helping out with the Maker Corp and I’ll be following shortly. I expect today to be a typical Maker Faire, amazing and inspiring a blow-your-mind experience.